1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to household cooking ranges, and specifically to a modular frame chassis for supporting an assemblage of elements comprising a household cooking range.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventional household cooking ranges typically have a “uni-body” construction in which the load-carrying, structural aspects are provided by the same elements that provide the architectural or aesthetic features of the range. An example of such a prior art construction is illustrated in FIG. 1 in which the principal structural components of a cooking range 10 are illustrated. The cooking range 10 comprises a housing 12 assembled from a front panel 14, a rear panel 16, and a pair of side panels 18, 20. A pair of base rails 22, 24 extend between the front and rear panels 14, 16 and mount a plurality of foot assemblies 26 that support the housing 12 relative to the floor. A cooktop panel 28 for use with a plurality of conventional burners (not shown) is attached to the top of the housing 12. An oven housing 32 defining a cooking chamber 34 is sandwiched between and supported by the front panel 14 and rear panel 16.
The front panel 14, rear panel 16, and side panels 18, 20 are typically large, planar elements, and must not only serve as an aesthetically pleasing enclosure, but must also provide structural support for the oven housing 32, the cooktop panel 28, the burners, a control panel, a drawer, and other such elements typically found in a conventional household cooking range. In order to provide the structural capability necessary to satisfactorily support these items, the front panel 14, rear panel 16, and side panels 18, 20 must be specially fabricated with reinforcing elements, such as bends, ribs, reinforcers, offsets, and the like. Such elements can be separately fabricated and attached, such as by welding, to the panel. Alternatively, the panel can be fabricated with these elements integrated into the panel by a stamping and rolling process utilizing specialized tooling, such as dies, cutting tools, and the like. A complete set of tooling must be provided for each panel comprising a cooking range configuration.
Additionally, panels that contain openings, such as gas or electric supply line openings, oven door openings 36, drawer openings 38, and the like, must be provided with structural reinforcing at and around such openings. This reinforcing also requires specialized tooling, and may even necessitate additional fabrication steps.
Reinforcing elements, whether separately fabricated and attached to the frame, or integrated into the frame, and the assembly of the frames into a housing, add considerable cost to the finished product. In particular, dies, cutting tools, and the like are frequently very expensive to manufacture and maintain, and the need for multiple sets of tooling for different cooking range frame configurations can be extremely costly.
There is a need for a household cooking range construction comprising interchangeable modular structural elements which can be readily modified to accommodate cooktop ranges of varying configurations and features.